By Antoinette Pombo

Millennials are commonly defined as those born between 1981 and 1996. That currently puts them at between 19 and 34 years of age.

The youngest of this generation will be in the throes of finding their own feet in the big wide world of employment or tertiary education…

Whilst many of their older counterparts will be settling down with their partners – some starting a family. But what does this really mean for South African marketers and brand managers?

Individuality, independence and career growth are extremely important to this generation at this stage of their lives. And their unique spending habits seem to be shaking things up fast.

The most significant contributing factors to this shake-up are the sheer size of this population segment as well as the rise of multimedia and networking.

The millennials make up about 26% of the South African population. To put this into perspective, the rest of the entire working population under the official age of retirement only makes up about 28% of the population in South Africa.

And although these percentages aren’t very different from 10 years ago, the actual numbers are significantly different. As marketers and brand managers, we have over one million “new” potential customers we can attract in this segment.

But that’s not all! This new up-and-coming generation has an extremely powerful force behind them: Instant communication and HUGE networking capabilities.

Consequently, as these millennials rise through the echelons of young adulthood, they’re shaping the future of brands, business and the economy – VERY fast!

Here’s your three-point checklist to ensure your brand is in the running to gain from this incredibly powerful generation…

• Take a little extra time to test the market to make sure your marketing touches the right emotional chords, otherwise, it could fall on deaf ears.
• Mellennials will read up on products and services of interest and compare brands much more so than past generations. Is your website packed with USEFUL information they can use to make their purchase decision? Do you target this generation specifically on your site or have you lumped the entire South African population into the same ‘box’? A message directed at a 50 year old is unlikely to be identical to a message targeted at a 20 year old.
• And finally, with the revolutionary expansion of the social networking landscape in recent history, millennials aren’t just connecting with friends online. They’re also connecting with thought leaders, idols, experts and other figures they’re interested in. Do you have a presence in this space? Here’s how to do that: You’re an expert on something if you provide a service or sell a product. So find a way to share your expert knowledge and advice with those who need it most – young potential customers. If you’re not the expert, find one! Hire idols or brand ambassadors the millennials aspire to in order to bring your product or service alive for this generation. Encourage this young generation to talk about your product/service and related topics. If you can get them personally involved in your brand, they’re more likely to engage with it. Of course, they’ll either love it or hate it so be sure you’ve worked out all the other bits, like your value proposition, customer service, return policies etc. There you have the most important reasons to sit up and pay attention to millennials.

If you don’t have a dedicated marketing strategy for this segment, you’re missing out. And worse, your brand’s future is at stake.If you need assistance getting to know this segment well and niching your marketing to this sector, speak to Youth Dynamix, Africa’s leading youth authority.

Website: www.ydx.co.za

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – January 28, 2015 – Under the banner “Creating Possibilities, Shaping the Future,” Samsung Electronics South Africa has unveiled its vision for smarter living at the company’s 2015 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) press conference.

Attended by more than 1,700 industry partners and media, Samsung showcased its next generation devices and services, led by an 88-inch SUHD TV and Samsung’s Milk VR virtual reality video service. With a focus on bringing the future into the home and creating experiences that enhance consumer lifestyles, the 2015 portfolio has already received 36 CES Innovation Awards.

“Delivering great experiences will be our focus in 2015,” said Matthew Thackrah, Deputy MD of Samsung Electronics SA. “More than ever, Samsung is focused on smarter living at the intersection between great technology, content and services. And, it’s our insight – that all innovation has to be focused on the consumer experience – which is underpinning Samsung’s success.”

SUHD TV Takes Picture Quality to New Heights Samsung unveiled the 88-inch JS9500 TV, powered by a proprietary, eco-friendly nano-crystal display technology and intelligent SUHD re-mastering engine. The SUHD TV is innovative in every way, delivering superior picture quality with stunning contrast, striking brightness, spectacular colour and superb UHD detail.  

The SUHD re-mastering engine automatically analyses the brightness of images to minimise additional power consumption while expressing stunning contrast levels – producing images with much darker blacks and an elevated brightness two-and-a-half times brighter than conventional TVs with twice the colour adjustment points.

SUHD TV’s nano-crystal semiconductor transmits different colours of light depending on their size to produce the highest colour purity and light efficiency available today. This technology produces a wide range of more accurate colours, providing viewers with twice the colour adjustment points and 64 times more colour expression than conventional TVs.

Collaborating with 20th Century Fox, Samsung is optimising content to deliver the premium quality of SUHD and give consumers an unrivaled UHD viewing experience. Most recently, Samsung partnered with the Fox Innovation Lab to re-master specifically for SUHD TV the critically acclaimed film, Exodus.

Renowned Hollywood colourist Stephen Nakamura explained to the press conference the importance of SUHD’s colour. “Colour really sets the tone for a movie. It can completely change the mood and the feel,” said Nakamura, who has worked on X-Men, Days of Future Past, Quantum of Solace and Exodus. “I recently re-mastered Exodus for the SUHD TV, and the experience was incredible. It really brought the film to life in ways I never thought possible.”   “Samsung is advancing UHD to the next-generation viewing experience, bringing never-before-seen-on-TV colours to life in your home,” said Ansgar Pabst, Business Lead for TV/AV at Samsung SA.

Samsung also unveiled the result of its collaboration with Yves Behar, the renowned designer and founder of the award-winning design firm Fuseproject. The 82-inch S9W TV is an exquisitely curved panel that sits on a metallic cube, reminiscent of a sculpture, giving any living room the ambience of an art gallery.

From 2015, all new Samsung Smart TVs will be powered by Tizen, which not only provides better connectivity, but also gives developers a more robust and easier platform for which to create new applications. Most importantly, it ensures that consumers will have access to a much broader range of Smart TV content and services than ever before.

Samsung also introduced innovative audio products that give consumers a more dynamic, surround-sound audio experience. Developed by Samsung’s new state-of-the-art audio lab in Los Angeles, California, the WAM7500/6500 deliver a 360-degree sound experience thanks to Samsung’s proprietary ring radiator technology, which enables true omni-directional sound both horizontally and vertically. The WAM7500/6500 fills the room with truly balanced sound. Led by the WAM7500/6500, Samsung plans to expand its audio line-up in 2015, focusing on a range of omni-directional 360 speakers and curved sound bars.

Samsung was joined by Mike Dunn, President of 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment, to announce the launch of the UHD Alliance, which aims to create a unified criterion for premium UHD platforms to ensure that consumers get the best possible UHD experience; the alliance brings together leading Hollywood studios, consumer electronics brands, content distributors, post-production and technology companies.

Digital Appliances Designed for a Better Lifestyle Innovation for Samsung’s Digital Appliances is putting the company on track for yet more success, following a year of unprecedented growth in the company’s home appliances business.   The Chef Collection, infused with the know-how of Michelin-starred chefs, truly transformed the kitchen appliances category during 2014. Now, Samsung is launching the second phase of the project, bringing their passion for cooking directly into the kitchen.

Star chefs will share their recipes and tips and tricks through the Chef Collection App, which - thanks to regular updates - will help consumers create that perfect culinary experience. For a limited time, consumers who purchase a Chef Collection appliance package are eligible to receive an exclusive Chef Collection tablet with the pre-installed Chef Collection app. It will guide consumers through the cooking process step-by-step. The tablet also comes with a custom butcher block and an engraved tablet stand.

Samsung’s new award-winning Flex DuoTM oven range with Dual DoorTM brings perfect flexibility to the home kitchen. It’s a concept that combines three ovens into one. The two doors integrate to provide three cooking configurations. The oven can either be large enough for that perfect big meal, or quickly transform into two ovens to make two separate dishes, such as a roast in one and a cake in the other. The Smart Divider separates the ovens to make sure neither heat nor smells transfer from one dish to the other – performance, efficiency and flexibility combined in a single oven.

For any family with children, persistent stains in the laundry are a frequent problem. Samsung makes it easy to pre-treat stains with the Samsung activewashTM top-loader washing machine. Treatment and pre-wash take place in the activewashTM’s built-in sink, complete with water jet and scrubbing surface, from where laundry can be dropped straight into the washing machine below. No more drip trails from the sink to the washer. Additionally, Samsung’s proprietary Super Speed technology has now reduced wash time to as little as 36 minutes.

Samsung also launched its POWERbot VR9000 robotic vacuum cleaner. Its Digital Inverter Motor delivers up to 60 times stronger suction power than previous robotic vacuums. Thanks to Visionary Mapping Plus, the POWERbot creates a complete map of the home, and calculates the most efficient cleaning path. It even finds its way back to its docking station for recharging.

MILK VR Delivers Virtual Reality Content Samsung continues to innovate in the mobile space. While next-generation devices will follow in the footsteps of the Galaxy Note Edge, the Gear S and the Gear VR, content offerings will continue to expand through Samsung MILK. Until now a streaming music service with millions of active users worldwide, Samsung MILK is not only adding its video discovery service, MILK Video, but will also expand to Smart TVs, and – for the music part – to the Web as well.

Fans of the Samsung Gear VR – the virtual reality headset powered by the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 – will also be able to tap into the MILK experience, with a daily stream of immersive 360-degree videos and VR channels for music, sports, action and lifestyle. The service will offer both “Instant Play” (progressive streaming) and “Best Quality” (download) options in the highest quality available (4K x 2K). Through daily content updates and curating of new videos, Gear VR users will always have fresh, immersive videos to explore.

In a first of its kind announcement, Samsung is partnering with Skybound Entertainment, producers of The Walking Dead, to create in 2015 the first mystery suspense thriller entirely produced for VR. Additionally, through content partnerships, including those with the National Basketball Association (NBA), Skybound Entertainment, RedBull, Mountain Dew, Acura, Artists Den, Refinery 29 and Boiler Room, Samsung will continue to bring dynamic virtual reality content to consumers.

New Era for Portable Storage with Samsung Portable SSD T1 Storage solutions that are fast, reliable and highly portable have been hard to come by – until now. Samsung Portable SSD T1 packs up to 1 terabyte of data into a drive no larger than a business card. Powered by 3D V-NAND technology, and with data read/write speeds that are four times faster than traditional external hard disks, the Samsung Portable SSD T1 makes it possible to save a 3GB movie file in just 8 seconds. With advanced hardware encryption, password software, shock resistance and dynamic thermal guard, the Samsung Portable SSD T1 is set to transform how we carry our data with us when on the move.   For more information, please visit: http://global.samsungtomorrow.com/CES2015

About Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is a global leader in technology, opening new possibilities for people everywhere. Through relentless innovation and discovery, we are transforming the worlds of TVs, smartphones, tablets, PCs, cameras, home appliances, printers, LTE systems, medical devices, semiconductors and LED solutions. We employ 286,000 people across 80 countries with annual sales of US$216.7 billion.

To discover more, please visit www.samsung.com.

For further information, please contact:

Carmen Steynberg
Andra-Lee Shimmin Epic Communications
Samsung Electronics South Africa
Tel: 011 784 4790 / 011 549 1627
Cell: 071 864 0266 / 082 553 2302
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. / This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Tonya Khoury, the MD of ROi Africa, the media monitoring and intelligence company supporting actor Ivan Zimmermann’s conquest to collect 12 000 cans of food for each of the 12 000km he travels, says Ivan has entered Sudan today after successfully completing his trip through Egypt on a bicycle!

“It’s gone well so far, but I am fully aware that I have very difficult days ahead with the extreme heat, but I also know #Leadersneverquit!” he says.

Zimmermann departed on the Tour d’Afrique on 9 January in Cairo and is expected to arrive on 9 May in Cape Town. For more information on Ivan’s quest, visit www.ivanzimmermann.com.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

NAME: Tonya Khoury
E-MAIL: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. 
CELL: 073 874 5377
WEBSITE: www.roiafrica.com
TWITTER: @tonyaroi / @roiafrica
FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/roiafrica

Tonya Khoury, MD of South Africa’s foremost media intelligence provider, ROi Africa, the media monitoring sponsor of actor, Ivan Zimmermann and his participation in the 2015 Tour d’Afrique, says everything is on track for Zimmerman’s departure from Cairo to Cape Town today (9 January).  

Zimmermann is participating in the world’s longest and most challenging 12 000km mountain bike adventure, to raise 12 000 tins of  foods for Can-a-Kilo. 

Media coverage of his adventure, also sponsored by the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA) and Sage Pastel, will be monitored closely by ROi Africa for the duration of the journey. They will also be providing media insights about the undertaking through their Smart Technology system  which measures, amongst others, more than 200 million social media platforms. 

Zimmermann, who is planning to reach Cape Town on 9 June, says, “I have always dreamt to travel through Africa for a good cause. This adventure through Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia, Botswana, Namibia and South Africa will provide me with a platform to make my dream and many children’s dreams come true,” he adds. 

The 12 000 cans of food will be distributed by the Hanna Charity and Empowerment Foundation in South Africa and collection points for the cans can be found on  www.ivanzimmermann.com. 

Ivan’s progress can also be monitored on: 

TWITTER: @IvanZimmermann1, @CANaKILO (#leadersneverquit, #12000km, #tourdafrique, #12000cans)
INSTAGRAM:    eyevanzimmer
FACEBOOK:     /Ivan.Zimmermann 

FOR MORE INFORMATION 

NAME:             Tonya Khoury
E-MAIL:          This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.    
CELL:              073 874 5377
WEBSITE:       www.roiafrica.com
TWITTER:       @tonyaroi / @roiafrica
FACEBOOK:     Facebook.com/roiafrica

Plascon has over a century of manufacturing firsts; innovations that have shown the brand’s commitment to provide consumers with the very best technologies and top quality products. Similarly, the company has always been known for its memorable advertising campaigns. Take its iconic 40-year-old Double Velvet brand, for example, one of the longest advertised brands on South African television. Now, Plascon has once again been recognised for marketing excellence by the greater industry.

South Africa’s leading coatings manufacturer recently received three prestigious awards for its forward-thinking point of sale executions, at the annual Point of Purchase Advertising International (POPAI) awards ceremony in South Africa. POPAI is a global network of more than 1700 members that recognizes innovation and strategic marketing in the retail industry - which is what Plascon always strives to achieve. The POPAI ceremony honoured remarkable point of purchase displays that have lifted sales, made products memorable and appealing, and enticed consumers to purchase. Plascon was nominated as finalists in 3 separate categories and was successful in all 3 categories, winning Gold, Silver and Bronze.

Plascon received a much-coveted Gold award for its Custom Colour Creation in Mass Retail, part of the Short Run Category (under 50 units). This was tailor-made specifically for Builders Warehouse Rivonia, a high-end mass retail environment introducing revolutionary displays and areas within a mass space where shoppers can experience and be inspired by brands.  Builders Warehouse is typically an environment that has seen a dominantly male shopper focus, is price point driven, and has lacked individual brand experiences. Plascon used this new opportunity to engage with prospective female shoppers and decision makers as they have been identified as the starting point of the shopper journey when purchasing paint.In order to provide inspiration for female consumers Plascon created a paint display similar to cosmetics displays. With elements such as LED backlighting, high-gloss Black Perspex, and paint-filled colour forecast jars, the display was not only clean and eye-catching but also user friendly.

The Plascon “colour experience zone”   was manned by trained consultants to ensure the customer service offering matched the aesthetics and colour offering. The zone has been a success not only in the sales out of the store, but aesthetically in terms of the concept, receiving international and local attention. This was a once-off execution, working closely with Builders Warehouse, to ensure a strategically positioned experience that benefited both brands. Plascon earned a Silver POPAI award for its Manchester United ‘Bring Home the Best’ Promotion, part of the Temporary Non Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) Category. The focus of the promotion was not on look-and-feel so much as user engagement. Since early 2013, Kansai Plascon and Manchester United Football Club have been associated through parent company Kansai’s sponsorship of Manchester United. This partnership has proved thoroughly successful. The Bring Home the Best campaign was run in store, on TV and across various social media channels and provided an incentive for consumers to buy Plascon products to stand a chance to win a trip to watch a Manchester United match at Old Trafford in England. Over the period of the campaign from November 2013 to February 2014, customer interaction grew and sales for the participating retailers were boosted by 3.1%. Therefore, although Kansai Plascon and Manchester United are from two different industries, the partnership between them has proved a valuable marketing strategy.

The final award Plascon received was a Bronze for its Inspired Colour 2 Stand, in the Permanent Non -FMCG category. In 2006, when Plascon first launched the Inspired Colour Stand, it was the most comprehensive coatings colour system in South Africa. The market has changed since then, and therefore Plascon saw the need to update its colour stand offering. It accomplished this through consumer research and customer feedback. The main finding was that people wanted to locate their paint colour choice quickly and easily. Therefore, the most popular colours were concentrated on and highlighted to make selection simpler and faster. This new Inspired Colour 2 Stand started to roll out in July 2014 and continues to replace the older versions in retail outlets.The three POPAI awards earned by Plascon in November 2014 demonstrate the company’s marketing prowess in the coatings industry and set benchmarks for other companies here and around the world.

Says Plascon’s Channel Marketing Executive, Michael van Harmelen: “Naturally, we are thrilled to have been recognized in three categories at the recent POPAI awards, including a Gold award. These awards only serve to prove what our customers have known all along, that Plascon is the brand to trust! But we’re not content to rest on these laurels.

As a marketing team, Plascon is already looking ahead to future trends and to further innovation in 2015.”Plascon can look to the future assured by the strength of its past. Since 1889 Plascon has been the force behind the production of top quality coatings with innovative and ground-breaking technologies, making it Southern Africa’s leading coatings manufacturer.

South African consumers, business people and politicians are standing in disbelief as two major South African business brands count the costs of underestimating the plight of the consumer. Contrary to popular personalities like Julius Malema and Steve Hofmeyr who have both had their fair share of negative publicity, but whose popularity seems largely unaffected, one can attempt only predict what the effect of the Cell-C billboard, Chester Missing on Steve Hofmeyr and the Woolworths boycotts will be.

The Woolworths boycott case has been reported on extensively in print, online, radio, television and social media. Social media for the Woolworths boycott accounts for 85% of the media attention.

If one removes social media from the equation, online news accounted for 42% of the press and broadcast a massive 40% for the Boycott Woolworths Campaign over the past month.  The biggest peak was on 19 November and can be attributed to the shareholders supporting the boycott and the endorsement by Cosatu.

“This sounds very impressive,” says Tonya Khoury, MD of Media Monitoring and Intelligence Company, ROi Africa. “But the pressing issue at hand is how do we measure the real effect the publicity had on the brand image? This is an issue that has been widely contested in global PR circles, but no definite conclusion has ever been reached. One thing that authoritative bodies like PRISA (Public Relations Institute) agree on is that the traditional measurement using advertising value equivalent (AVE) might not be the most effective way in measuring media publicity,” she says.

Due to a lack of a definite alternative, the majority of public relations practitioners use the Advertising Value Equivalent (AVE) measurement method regardless of its lack of support by the authorities. This measure compares the cost of a paid advertisement with the same amount of space or airtime of an unpaid publicity item. Says Khoury: “Ironically, the ‘value’ of AVE is widely recognised as unreliable and invalid but many people still use it. It’s because they need to attribute a rand value to media coverage.” 

With diminishing advertising prices and hard earned content, AVE has often resulted in exaggerations due with the use of multiplier factors based on prominence, image impact, prestige of the media channel and other criteria.

This aside though, markets have become increasingly unsure about how to add a rand value to the successful minimisation of negative publicity or bad news. “One cannot say that the fact that a clever PR strategy kept a brand out of the negative media spotlight is worthless in rand terms,” Khoury says.

“My stance on AVE: it is rubbish!  It also does not take into consideration the monitoring of social media, which is an issue in itself. Social media platforms like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, etc. are overflowing with new users that interact with and follow brand profiles. Just think what the Oscar Pistorius Trial would have been without Twitter! There are so many more reasons why AVE is absolutely pointless, let’s take some examples from the case studies we’ve been doing:

The Sunday Times published an article about Woolworths titled “Humble Pie for ‘arrogant’ Woolies” The article appeared on page 9 of the main body of the publication in black and white, resulting in an AVE of just under R80k – is it true to say that R80k is the level of damage the article made to Woolworths?  Is it true to say that if Woolworths had managed to keep this article out of the press it was worth an extra R80k in advertising toward Woolworths? What exactly does R80k for the article mean? Nothing!

Social Media has been the primary vehicle for #boycottwoolworths, as there is no accurate measurement in terms of Rands for Twitter. Are we as a market saying that the hashtag campaign was worth no money at all? I believe Woolworths would beg to differ as would BDS SA.”

ROi Africa believes that each medium needs its own best measure and a host of other metrics that can ascertain the success or failure of your PR  

Khoury adds, “Changing the Public Relations industry’s perception is more than a tough task and for that reason ROi Africa still offers AVE, and actually we offer rands and cents measurement on all media including social. We do, however, hope that the market will move to global measurement over time. We are using Source Rank, Moz Rank, Target Sections, Circulations, traffic and so much more than AVE to measure thus giving the brand a more accurate view of what the actual publicity value truly was.”  

Oscar Wilde said “The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about” and in some instances that is true.  There is also positive bottom line value in some negative press. “Julius Malema is one controversial figure in the media space and he draws on negative qualities like fierce temperaments, controversial statements and much more and it works.  Media loves Juju, that’s a fact.  At ROi Africa we have often seen our charts and analytics painted EFF Red because of clever and largely negative PR.”  

But how would you measure your PR? And that of your brand? This is a question we need to find an answer to, especially if the consumers turn against you or your brand. Not everybody is a Juju or a Steve Hofmeyr.

Website: www.roiafrica.com

'Consumers are thorough in the way in which they research and book their holidays', according to research recently conducted by Essential Travel Info in association with Vanessa Sand Tourism Marketing.  

Vanessa Sand, has been involved in tourism marketing since publishing the first edition of the Self-Catering Getaways guide in 1988. “It is important to find the most cost effective ways in which to reach travel bookers. We looked at some outstanding research done in overseas markets and could not find similar research for our local market. Hence the decision to perform such a survey. If tourism products want to fine tune their marketing budgets, the best way to do this is to know how their guests are researching and making decisions about the travel products they buy.”  

The research looked at how accommodation is researched and booked, which websites are top of mind for leisure travellers, which airline websites are used for researching and booking, whether restaurants and activities are booked online ahead of time or on arrival, and based on information sourced from where, as well as how important star grading is, which review sites are used most, whether people access the web on their desktop/laptops or on their smart phones or tablets among other things.   Results were processed and confirmed by De Facto Media and Marketing.  

The results give a very clear direction as to what marketing options are more or less worthwhile.   The research results may be ordered from www.vanessasand.com/order-survey.   If tourism products are looking only at the local market then the local research results are adequate.   However establishments who are keen to get international guests may order a composite report packaging the local research results with research done overseas in some of our major inbound markets.

For more information:
Vanessa Sand
tel: 011 713 2000
visit: www.vanessasand.com/order-survey/

Helen de Coster
tel: 011 440-2911
visit: www.vanessasand.com/order-survey/ 

The festive season is the season for giving, while spending time with family, enjoying ample entertainment and receiving gifts galore. The sad thing is that there are so many children who will not be receiving gifts or love this festive season. In the spirit of generosity and the fact that children are such a huge focus of the Spur Group, Spur Foundation is coordinating a national toy collection drive to put a smile on some underprivileged children’s faces.

Between 1 December 2014 and 16 January 2015 collection boxes for new and pre-loved toys will be available at all Spur, John Dory’s and Panarottis restaurants countrywide. These boxes will be allocated to a Spur Foundation beneficiary per province. The beneficiaries are:         

• Gauteng: ASHA Trust: A South African NGO that establishes and supports formal and home-based early childhood centres in economically challenged communities by providing daily pre-school care, meals and educational stimulation for less-fortunate children aged 2–6.        
• Western Cape:    
  • Durbanville Children’s Home: A home providing a safe haven for children who have suffered from physical and emotional abuse.    
  • Umnqophiso Pre-primary: A nursery school and aftercare centre in the disadvantaged community of Lwandle in the Strand.   
  • House of Grace: Place of safety for abandoned and abused children who have been through tremendous hardship and previous neglect.        
• KwaZulu-Natal: Durban Children’s Home: A home providing love, care and shelter to abandoned, neglected and orphaned children throughout KwaZulu-Natal since 1905.         
• Free State: Botshelo Centre: A centre aimed to prevent HIV infection and distribute information relating to HIV/Aids.        
• Eastern Cape: Inn Safe Hands: A safe-house and foster home that cares for vulnerable children brought to us from abused, abandoned or molestation backgrounds.

Spur Foundation runs this campaign on an annual basis, due to their commitment to the welfare of children in South Africa. The Toy Drive, supported by CourierIT, Longstreet Media and Nampak, collected 77 boxes filled with toys in the 2013 period.

“According to a 2014 National Adoption Coalition Report, there are 18.5 million children in South Africa. Orphans are estimated at about 5.2 million children. Over 13 000 live in residential care facilities and an estimated 10 000 live on the streets of South Africa. And that excludes the children that are with their families, but in such dire circumstances where they cannot afford basic necessities, never mind toys,” says Ronel van Dijk, Chairperson of the Spur Foundation.

The Spur Foundation was founded on Mandela Day in 2012, with an initial R670 000 donation from the Spur Group. Spur’s value of generosity and focus on family will be carried through to the Foundation’s various initiatives throughout the year, which are committed to Nourish, Nurture, Now!

FOR MORE INFORMATION:

NAME: Ronel van Dijk, Chairperson of the Spur Foundation and Chief Financial Officer of Spur Corporation Limited    
TEL: 021-5555100
E-MAIL: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
WEBSITE: http://www.spurfoundation.co.za
TWITTER: @SpurRestaurant #SpurToyDrive #PanasToyDrive #JDsToyDrive
FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/SpurSteakRanches

On the dawn of Youth Dynamix’s 15th year anniversary next month, we reflect on how the youth market has transformed in this short space of time and how marketers have had to adapt to survive.  

There’s no doubt, the marketing of goods and services have undergone a profound transformation over the past 15 years. Regulatory advances, new technologies and increasingly open global markets have all played their part in changing how the youth react and interact with products and services.  

The information conundrum….

Children and young adults are more significant forces in the marketplace now. But, while new technologies offer more access to information overall, many young consumers today lack the necessary skills to cope with the increasingly complex, information-intensive marketplaces they’re faced with.  

With many companies struggling to differentiate themselves in a highly competitive open market, they’re forced to bundle related products and offerings, making it difficult for consumers to compare them. As a result, young consumers have had to learn more about markets in order to make good decisions.  

“Show me, don’t tell me”

The youth’s ability and willingness to trade with a company depends on their level of confidence in it. That’s why it’s so important you don’t ignore brand activations. There are very few marketing activities as powerful as brand activations. This because they involve experiential, interactive, emotive and sustainable involvements with the brand. Overall, brand activations offer a more holistic view of the product and allow for an emotive connection with the brand – you cannot offer using new technologies alone.

Be sure to get the most out of your budget…

All engagement and communication campaigns developed by Youth Dynamix (YDx) include an element of measurability.  This gives you the assurance that you’ve met your ROI and have made a relevant impact in the market.   YDx is a youth & family specialist research and marketing agency.

To activate your brand in the youth market, contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 071 551 8200.

www.ydx.co.za

This November, Gartner published its Magic Quadrant for Enterprise Information Archiving. The Magic Quadrant positions vendors in a particular market segment based on completeness of vision and ability to execute. GWAVA's archiving solution, Retain, made it into the quadrant as an innovative and future-oriented software. Gartner analysts Alan Dayley, Garth Landers, Anthony Kros and Jai Zhang write: "Retain's administrative and compliance interface is easy to use for both administrators and compliance personnel, and GWAVA's ability to handle almost any messaging data type allows for a centralised messaging data compliance experience. Retain allows for easy search and e-discovery across multiple outside data sources not held within the archive repository."

Retain's archiving capabilities are important because, as Gartner has stated: "By 2019, 75% of organisations will treat archived data as an active and 'nearline' data source, and not simply as a separate repository to be viewed or searched periodically, up from less than 10% today."

Gartner goes on to say: "GWAVA is one of the few vendors that offers native Gmail archiving support. Retain has the ability to search and take action on outside data sources and to conduct e-discovery activities across any connected data set."

Click here to get access to the Gartner Magic Quadrant report...

Retain unified archiving Retain by GWAVA provides multi-platform unified message archiving of all e-mail (including Exchange, Office 365, Gmail and GroupWise), social media, and mobile communication data (for BlackBerry, Android and iOS) for case assessment, search, and e-discovery, and can be deployed on-premises or in the cloud. The Retain archive is accessible by end-users and administrators directly through Retain's Web Access Archive Viewer. This enables your organisation to quickly access, search, and audit archived communication data, as well as to easily place litigation holds, print, forward, save, redact, and export your message data. Retain reduces cost, mitigates risk, and manages complexity on-premises or in the cloud.

www.rdgroup.co.za